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Add in a terrorrorrorrist subplot, a hot blonde PhD who drips when she sees the studly military man assigned to the lab, and you got an idea. Write up a treatment on this & let's pitch it to SyFy, should be able to get a 5 mil budget outta this...

Saw Jon Stewart a few years ago and, while talking about the poltical scene in general he made a pretty good comment along the lines of "When the world ends the very last thing we'll hear is some scientist saying "It works!"'

I actually noticed a pattern among people who do certain fields of science, we are always willing to experiment on ourselves. I know that it is dangerous to point the laser to my eyes, I know I shouldn't touch that naked wire, and I know that I shouldn't mix these two substances together, yet the inquisitive part of my brain takes control and tell my self-preservation module. So will probably kill myself long before I do anything significant enough.

After you've destroyed the Universe, again, we'll simply take notes and restart the simulation.
If you really wanted to mess up our contingency plans, then you'd have to live out this iteration while NEVER destroying the Universe -- Tricking us into thinking you're harmless enough to release in the real world, where you could actually carry out your secret plans.

On your point.... do you believe there are questions we shouldn't ask? To me, vaporizing the earth from a how-to perspective seems taboo.... that the gains from the answer may not be worth the risk of making publicly available answers that others could utilize....

The flaw in this research, in my opinion, is that the ambitions and ego of the researchers are more powerful than the obvious cautions/repercussions. And while we would like to answer every question about the universe, might we consider the cu

I don't believe science in its purist form can have any taboo. To be honest, vaporizing Earth for me is more of engineering question. But "How to change the trajectory of earth sized planet" is a scientific question for me. I think the way I see it, is that science is neutral, and anything beyond that is just humans tinkering with it.
Quoting Prof Farnsworth:

Amy, technology isn't intrinsically good or evil it's how it's used. Like the death ray.

Scientists don't usually endanger themselves and others if/when they design research and experiments. I do iPS Cell research and I wouldn't do anything I could concieve might hurt me or others. Most dangerous elements in my work can be accounted for, we glove/suit up to protect from virii and other materials. But in the case we are talking about, the dangerous byproduct is the alternate utility of the knowledge.... you could say that we might be safe by limiting access to the materals that this hypothet

After the cross convergence of the myriad of simulations we'd probably by now live in a forgotten corner of the simulation matrix which nobody knows or remembers anything about. The feeling of loneliness in the vast space keeps the dreams of living in a simulation alive - there just has to be somebody who is interested in us/me.